Beauty Is Within Us
by Lil6ter
Summary: Do you know who you are? Koga does, and unfortunately for Koga, so does the rest of the world. Songfic. One-shot.


_Disclaimer: I love the only Inuyasha related thing I own. My cute little chibi inu key-chain which lives out its happy life on my iPod making fashion statements everywhere (Ha! Take that Parris Hilton! You want something hot? Then look at my iPod cuz it's so cute and knows how to accessorize.)_

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Beauty Is Within Us  
By: Lil6ter

He pounded his hand against the wall, tears streaming down his face. Why it was so easy for everyone to see him on the inside. He thought that he was acting like a normal boy. He leaned his head against the brick wall, trying to take deep breaths to get back in control, but it wasn't working this time. He turned around and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked normal. He looked like a seventeen-year-old boy. Black hair. Light blue eyes. Nothing was wrong with him. And yet…there was. He…he was a boy…but…he wasn't a boy.

_Oh mother dear  
Look what you've done  
To your forlorn and once beloved son  
Why was I born at all?  
Oh mother dear  
I'm such a freak  
A mutant man, a woman underneath  
Why was I born at all?_

He slid down the locker room wall, grasping onto his head as the tears continued to drip down his face, gathering at the chin he had tried to grow hair on but couldn't. He just couldn't stomach the feel of it, so he shaved. He had gone to school once with the hair on his face, but he regretted that. They had punched and kicked him just as they had before, and just as they had today. He was a freak. He wasn't a boy, but he wasn't a girl either.

_It's you I blame for all the shame  
This anguish and this aching  
The mirror turned against the wall  
Myself despised, forsaken_

He tilted his head back once more, just barely glimpsing the mirror. That cocky mirror. It told lies. Look at it, sitting there smug as can be, showing him what he was supposed to be. That damn mirror…those damn boys…Damn them…Damn them…Damn Them! He picked up the pipe next to him, the same one that they had beat him with, and threw it at the mirror, shattering it. He didn't care what would come of that. He just didn't give a fuck anymore. He got up and retrieved the pipe, smashing it against the other mirrors in the locker room.

_You say, "Beauty is within us, your mother knows"  
"There's a beauty that's within us, just like a rose"  
You say, "Beauty is within us, so let it grow"  
But it's grown so dark and ugly_

He cursed them all to hell. He stopped counting the times that he had been shoved up against the mirror and shown what he was. How he had been "made the girl he was supposed to be" against it, watching as they all laughed. Why him? What did he do to deserve this! Why did he have to become so bitter in life? Life's whipping boy.

_Oh mother dear  
I curse you so  
For breathing life into your wretched son  
Why were you born at all?  
Oh mother dear  
I love you so  
Oh please forgive this anger in my soul  
Without you I'm alone_

He hated everything. He hated life. He hated himself. He hated those boys who did this to him on a daily basis. Didn't they get it? He didn't want to be like this. He wanted to be normal, just like everyone else. If he could. He would be a boy…but he wasn't.

_It's me who's been eternally damned  
Trapped inside this cage, a ruined man  
All damaged and depraved_

No…he was stuck like this. Stuck as a boy. He had noticed the signs when he was younger, and so had his parents. He hated the pants he had to wear, and the cars that he had when he was a boy. He wanted to play with the dolls and the jewelry. He wanted to wear a dress. His breathing was heavy and he could feel his heart in his throat, pounding, pounding to the beat of something. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Ba bum. Even his heart mocked him. Koga fisted his hands into his hair, pulling it hard. Harder. He cried out into the empty locker room as he picked up the pipe and smashed it against the benches, breaking them to splinters. He broke into the lockers and ripped up the gym shorts and flushed the cups down the toilets, causing them to overflow and flood the room. That is when he ran.

_Oh mother dear  
This misery  
Has settled like a stain upon my skin  
-a vast unspoken sin_

He ran as fast as he could out of the building and away from the school, ignoring the calls from someone behind him. He wanted for this life, this existence to end, and he knew how to do it, so he ran, and kept running until his lungs were burning, raw from breathing hard and fast from the run.

_And my mistake is much too late  
But your mistake was trusting  
That out of grief, a goodness comes  
And love comes out of lusting_

He opened the door and ran in, finding his mother on the phone with someone. Whatever that person said, it had caused her great pain and anger, though she concealed it expertly. Her eyes were the only implication that something was wrong. She slowly hung up the phone, her back to him. The room was silent before she spoke.

"Is there something you would like to tell me?"

"I was jumped again, I destroyed the boy's locker room, and I want a sex change."

"I see," she whispered, silent for a moment afterwards until she asked, "Have you told your Father this yet?"

"I was going to when he got home."

"What about Inuyasha?"

"No. Should I?"

"He is your best friend."

"His opinion doesn't matter."

_You say, "Beauty is within us, your mother knows"  
"There's a beauty that's within us, just like a rose"  
You say, "Beauty is within us, so let it grow"  
But it's grown so dark I can not see you anymore_

His mother's look told him that she did not believe this, but nodded and firmly told him, "I am pulling you out of that school. Let's wait until your Father gets home, and then we can talk about looking for a doctor."

"You will let me go though with this?"

"You were never like a little boy. Frankly, I am surprised that it has taken you this long to open up about it and ask."

"Thank you, mom," he whispered, running forward to hug her—accidentally smearing some of the blood from on his cheek onto her white shirt. "Thank you for understanding and being there for me."

"I will always be there for you. Go wash up and then we can start treating those."

_"O beauty is within us, mother knows"  
"O beauty is within us, like a rose"  
"O beauty is within us, let it grow"  
"O mother dear, let me out of here!"_

He walked up the stairs, stripping down and stepping into the shower. What would he tell Inuyasha. He had to tell him something. He had been encouraging him to get the change done for years. He decided as he watched the pink water flow down the drain that he would just call and see what happened from there. He stepped out of the shower and grabbed a phone after he toweled off and dressed. Slowly, he punched the numbers in and waited for him to answer.

"Hello?" a husky voice said. Never before had Koga let the sound of his best friends voice send shivers of want up his spine.

"Yash?"

"Koga! What the hell is wrong with you? I waited for an hour for you to show up so we could study for history, and then when I see you, you run away like the houn—"

"Yash!"

"What?"

"I'm changing my name."

"What the fuck is that gonna do…for…you?"

"I like the name Kagome, don't you? I think that it will suit me after the surgery."

He was silent for a moment, waiting for his friend to say something.

"Kagome, huh? I like it."

"Me too."

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A/N: It needed a happy-ish ending. I think that this is possibly one of the greatest pains in the world that someone can experience, and I hope that this got people thinking, and that I did a fairly decent portrayal of what it is like to live with that. (No…I don't have any first hand experience). This is and will remain a one-shot unless people beg me for more.


End file.
